Each player begins play with 30 life. The objective of Shoulder of Orion is to reduce your opponent's life total to 0. The first player whose life total reaches 0 loses. You will do this by recruiting warriors, using cunning actions, and attacking your opponent while defending yourself.
Each deck must contain 3 heroes. Each hero must share at least one Faction with another hero. For instance, you may choose Banneret Apollo (Union) as your first hero. If you do, you must select another hero with the Union faction as your next hero. If you choose The Child (Swarm/Union) as your second hero, you may select any Union or Swarm hero as your final hero.
Each player's deck will consist of 40 cards plus 3 heroes. No more than 3 cards with the same English name can be included in the deck, and no more than 1 hero with the same English name can be included in the deck. You may choose any number of general cards (cards without a listed subfaction) that correspond to any of your heroes' factions. You may choose any number of cards that correspond with the subfaction of each of your heroes. If you have chosen a hero with the Hybrid subfaction, you may choose Hybrid cards that contain both of the factions listed on the hero.
For instance, if you chose Banneret Apollo (Union - Knights) as your first hero, you can select any number of general Union, Generic or Knights cards to add to your deck. If you chose The Child (Swarm/Union - Hybrid) as your second hero, you can select general Swarm cards to add to your deck, as well as Hybrid cards that list Swarm/Union as their faction. If you then choose to take Aestus Lord (Swarm - Tide) as your final hero, you could add Tide cards to your deck.
Each player may have a sideboard of up to 10 cards. These cards can include cards of any faction, subfaction, or type except heroes.
Players have a maximum hand size of 7 cards. At the end of each of their own turns, players draw 3 cards from the top of the deck into their hands. If, after drawing, a player has more than 7 cards in their hand, they must place cards from their hand on the bottom of their deck until they have only 7 cards in hand.
The AO (Area of Operations) is the main zone in which all permanents (cards that persist in the play area, as opposed to cards that take effect and are then discarded) reside when they are resolved. When a permanent is played, it is considered to "enter the AO."
All Heroes begin play in the Hero Zone. Cards in the Hero Zone cannot be targeted.
While paying for a card or ability, a player may place a card from their hand face-up into the Energy Stack. Doing so adds 1 to that player's Energy Pool. At the end of each turn, each player places the cards from their Energy Stack on the bottom of their deck in the order of their choosing.
Once per turn, any time they could play an action, a player may choose to place a card from their hand face-up into the Cache. If a player does so, they may draw a card from their deck.
To pay for a card, a player may choose to place all the cards in their Cache face-up into their Energy Zone and add a number of Energy to their Energy Pool equal to the number of cards that were placed in the Energy Zone. Players cannot add cards to the Cache and use this ability in the same turn.
Each player has a number of Orbit slots equal to their current Tech Level (see Tech Levels, below). A player may place a card from their hand face-down into an empty Orbit slot as an action. Cards in orbit can be played as though they were in their controller's hand, though they may not be placed into the Cache nor the Energy Stack.
When two players have agreed to a game and have brought legal decks and sideboards, those players will first reveal the characters they are using to one another. Then, each player will have an opportunity to switch cards between their deck and their sideboard, provided that they have a legal deck for play when they are finished. Once sideboarding is complete, the players will randomly determine who gets to choose whether to go first or second.
Each player draws a hand of 5 cards before the game begins. The player who goes second also puts the top card of their deck face-up into their Cache before the game begins. The player who goes first may not use any Attack Actions, either from hand or from Character or Warrior abilities, until the first turn has concluded.
To play a card or activate an ability, first reveal the card and, if the card or ability requires that you nominate a target, do so. Then, pay any associated costs with the card or ability. In the case of a card, you must pay Energy equal to the number in top-right corner of the card by placing that many cards into your Energy zone. Then, pay any additional costs as described in the card's text box. In the case of abilities, pay any costs listed before the dash (-) in the ability. A number enclosed in parentheses indicates that you must pay that much Energy to activate the ability. An E enclosed in parentheses indicates that you must Exert the card to activate the ability. Other costs may also be listed.
In either case, after all costs are paid and all targets are chosen for the card or ability, the card goes onto the stack (see The Stack, below) either player (beginning with the inactive player, see Anatomy of a Turn, below) may play an instant in response to the card or ability. Instants always resolve before the card or ability they are played in response to (see When can I play Instants, below).
After a card or ability is played and all cards and effects above it on the stack have resolved, or it is the top card on the stack and both players have declined to play any further cards to the stack, it then resolves. The way to resolve a card depends on its type. All cards and abilities except Actions, Attack Actions and Instants resolve in the same way - it enters the AO and is then considered to be resolved. Any effect on the card not labeled as an Action or Instant is considered to be continuous and ongoing as long as that card is in the AO, and is known as a permanent.
To resolve an Action or Instant, if the Action or Instant is a card, do what the card says in the text box, then place the card in the Discard pile. If the Action or Instant is an ability, do what the ability says, but do not place the card in the Discard pile.
To resolve an Attack Action, first choose a target. This target can be either the opposing player or one of their fortifications. You may not choose one of their warriors as the target. Then, the defending player will declare whether they want to block the Attack Action with any of their warriors. If they do, the attack will first deal damage to the blocking warriors, with the damage distributed among those warriors as the attacking player decides. Any damage in excess of those warriors' health will continue through and damage the intended target as normal. For instance, if a player plays an Attack Action that deals 3 damage targeting the defending player, and the defending player chooses to block with a warrior that has 1 health, the defending player's warrior will accrue 1 damage counter and be destroyed, and the defending player will still take the remaining 2 damage from the attack. The attacking player must always distribute damage to defending warriors if able, until all the damage is distributed or until each warrior has a number of damage counters on it equal to its Health value.
If the Attack Action originated from a warrior, and is blocked by a warrior, then each warrior will put damage counters on the other equal to their attack values, up to the maximum health of the other warrior. Note that the defending player's warrior will not deal damage to the opponent's life or fortifications, even if the damage the defending player's warrior deals is in excess of the attacking player's warrior's health.
Note: A warrior can block only one attack per turn. Set blocking warriors to one side to denote that they have blocked.
Warriors and Fortifications will have one of three supertypes; land, air or space. These supertypes determine how warriors can attack or block.
A player's Tech Level determines which cards they can play. Each player begins the game at Tech Level 1. Every card has a Tech Tier in the upper left corner of the card that denotes the minimum Tech Level a player must have in order to play that card.
Each player begins the game at Tech Level 1. During a player's Play Step, they may choose to spend 2 Energy to increase their Tech Level by 1. Doing so also increases the number of orbit slots available to that player by 1.
Cards can exert in a number of situations. Warriors enter the AO exerted and can exert to block. Cards also exert whenever they pay a cost of (E) to activate an ability. To note that a card is exerted, turn it sideways. An exerted card cannot exert or be exerted again until it rallies.
Every hero starts the game in its backline form. Every hero can transform from its backline to its frontline form and vice-versa. To do so, pay the Transform cost. When you do, flip the card over. If you Transformed the warrior into its frontline form, it enters the AO. If you Transformed the warrior into its backline form, it returns to the Hero Zone. The frontline form is considered a warrior for all purposes.
When a hero would be removed from the AO while in frontline form for any reason, Exhaust it and Transform it into its backline form, and return it to the Hero Zone.
The Active Player is the player whose turn it currently is. The Inactive Player is the player whose turn it currently is not.
Any effects that take place at the beginning of the active player's turn resolve. After all such effects resolve, proceed to the main phase.
During the Play Step, the active player may play any Action, Attack Action, Augment, Aura, Fortification, Instant, Item or Warrior card they have in their hand or Orbit, or may play any ability of a permanent they control in the AO. If they play a card or ability to the stack, and that card or ability would resolve, proceed to the resolution step. If the active player declines to play any cards or activate any abilities during the play step, proceed to the End Phase.
During the resolution step, the top card on the stack (the most recently played card to the stack) resolves and takes effect. After the resolution step, if there are any cards remaining on the stack, there will be another resolution step for the next card on the stack. Otherwise, proceed to another play step.
The cache cards substep may occur any time during the play step whenever the active player decides to cache a card.
The orbit cards substep may occur any time during the play step whenever the active player decides to orbit a card.
Any effects that take place at the end of the active player's turn resolve. After all such effects resolve, proceed to the rally step.
All cards the active player controls rally. Then, proceed to the cleanup step.
All damage counters are removed from all warriors. Then proceed to the cleanup energy stack substep before proceeding to the draw cards step.
Each player, beginning with the active player, places cards from their Energy Zone face-down on the bottom of their deck in whatever order they choose until there are no cards left in the Energy Zone.
The active player draws three cards from the top of their deck into their hand. Then proceed to the orbit cards substep, then the cleanup hand substep.
The active player has one final chance to Orbit any cards from their hand. This can include any newly-drawn cards.
The active player places cards from their hand face-down on the bottom of their deck until their hand contains no more than 7 cards.
Finally, the inactive player becomes the active player and vice-versa, and a new turn begins.
Instants can be played in the following situations:
Priority (who gets first choice to play an instant) begins with the inactive player. When the inactive player either plays a card or declines to play an instant in any of the presented situations, the active player becomes eligible to play an instant or to decline to play an instant. When both players have declined to play an instant, play continues.
Cards and effects that are played but have yet to resolve go to the stack. You could represent the stack by literally stacking unresolved cards on top of one another. Typically, a stack will only contain more than one card in the following situations:
In these situations, cards resolve in reverse order from which they were played. The most recently-played card or effect will resolve first, and the original card or effect that began the stack will resolve last.
Name: This is listed in the top center of the card.
Faction: This is listed in the middle center of the card, and precedes the card's Type. This value is used to determine which cards can be in a deck.
Supertype: This is listed in the middle center of Warriors and Fortifications, after the card's Faction, and determines how a card can attack or block.
Type: This is listed in the middle center of the card after the card's Faction (or Supertype in the case of Warriors and Fortifications), and determines how the card can be played.
Subtype: This is listed in the middle center of the card after the card's Type.
Subfaction: This is listed in the bottom-center of the card, and does not appear on general cards. This value is used to determine which cards can be in a deck.
Tech Tier: This is listed in the top-left of the card as a numeric value, and describes the minimum Tech Level a player must achieve before they can play that card.
Cost: This is listed in the top-right of the card as a numeric value, and describes how many energy it costs to play a card.
Attack: This is listed in the bottom-left of Attack Actions, Characters and Warriors, and describes how much damage a card deals when attacking.
Health: This is listed in the bottom-right of Warriors and Fortifications, and describes how much damage a card can take before it is destroyed.
Card Text: This is listed just below the Type and Faction box, and describes what a card does when it is resolved. Card text always overrides rules.
Action cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They are placed in the Discard pile when they resolve.
Attack Action cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They are placed in the Discard pile when they resolve.
Augment cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They are attached to a warrior, and stay in the AO for as long as that warrior does. If the augmented warrior leaves the AO for any reason, the Augment goes into the Discard pile.
Aura cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They stay in the AO until another effect removes them, and their effects are usually continuous.
Backline Hero cards begin the game in play and cannot be removed from the Hero Zone except when they Transform into their frontline form.
Frontline Heroes count as warriors in all respects, except that when they would leave the AO due to being destroyed, Bounced, banished or otherwise, they instead Transform into their backline form and become Exhausted.
Fortification Cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They stay in the AO until another effect removes them, or the number of damage counters on them equals or exceeds their listed Health value. Fortifications may be targeted independently of players when attacks are declared, and they will accrue one damage counter for every point of damage the attack would deal to them. These damage counters do are not removed at the end of the turn.
Instant cards may be played at any time, and are usually played in response to another card or effect. An Instant card resolves before the card or effect it is played in response to. Instant cards are placed in the Discard pile when they resolve.
Item cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They stay in the AO until another effect removes them.
Warrior cards may only be played during the Active Player's Main Phase. They enter the AO exerted and stay in the AO until an effect removes them or the number of damage counters on them equals or exceeds their listed health value. Warriors cannot be directly targeted by attack cards or attack actions, and they will accrue one damage counter for every point of damage the attack would deal to them. These damage counters are removed at the end of each turn.